


Could I Fall?

by areyouarealmonster



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-02
Updated: 2018-11-02
Packaged: 2019-08-14 17:55:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,546
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16497437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/areyouarealmonster/pseuds/areyouarealmonster
Summary: Yaz settles in to her new home on the TARDIS, with the Doctor.





	Could I Fall?

**Author's Note:**

> Content warning: a line near the end about being temporarily submerged in water

The Doctor shows Yaz to a room. Well, more like the Doctor gestures grandly and Yaz follows the softly blinking lights to a room bigger than half a floor of her flat, to a room with walls that move and shift with what she imagines must be the pattern of the stars outside those magical blue walls. 

 

No, science. Not magic, the Doctor said. Alien science, Yaz assumes. Whatever kind of alien the Doctor is. She looks human enough, but she’s also weird enough that Yaz doesn’t even question her alienness. 

 

Weird in a good way, though. Weird in ways that Yaz understands, that she is drawn to. Weird in ways that Yaz wants to get to know more. 

 

She’s too wired to sleep, and there’s nothing much in the room besides the slowly shifting walls and a bed that her hand sinks into just the right amount when she pushes at the top of it a bit. An empty wardrobe sits in the corner, hulking in size but dwarfed by the rest of the bedroom. Maybe Yaz should have brought a go bag. 

 

Maybe Yaz should have thought before jumping feet-first into this. 

 

Nah.

 

She stalks out, back to the front of the ship, to the bridge of the TARDIS. 

 

The Doctor notices her, looks up from tinkering away at something unfamiliar to Yaz, but the Doctor’s deft fingers move across it like it’s second nature to her. 

 

“Can’t sleep?” she asks, her eyes flicking across Yaz’s face and back down to what she was working on. 

 

“Too wired,” Yaz replies, running her hand along one of the pinkish crystalline pillars surrounding the center console. “What is this?” 

 

“Makes the ship go,” the Doctor says, glancing up again with a cheeky grin. 

 

“Not gonna explain it?” Yaz asks. 

 

The Doctor’s grin widens. “Where’s the fun in that?” 

 

“You don’t know what it is, do you?” Yaz shoots back, her smile growing to match the Doctor’s. 

 

The Doctor winks. Yaz’s hands suddenly feel clammy, and she pulls them off the smooth-yet-jagged surface to stuff them in her pockets. Her smile feels too large for her face, and she ducks her head to shake the Doctor's gaze, rocking back on her heels and staring off into the nothingness of the pulsing pink glow of the crystal. 

 

“I could explain it,” the Doctor muses, “but then I’d need to walk you through the basic principles of TARDIS technology, and that’s—well, technically that’s a year-long course but I could give you a rush job in about an hour.” 

 

“That's all right,” Yaz says, her face still hot, her palms still sweaty. “It's pretty.” 

 

“Isn't it??”

 

Silence falls between them; the only sounds on the bridge the Doctor’s muttered curses as she fiddles with bits and pieces of the console. “Used to do this—where’s the switch—come on gorgeous, where’d you go—AH!” 

 

Yaz narrowly misses getting hit by flying sparks, but the Doctor’s exclamation seems to be one of excitement, not of worry, because her grin when Yaz removes her hands from shielding her eyes is big enough to light up the whole night sky. 

 

“Did you fix something?” Yaz asks, finding her footing again. 

 

“I absolutely did!” The Doctor says proudly, and then gently smacks the console when it beeps at her. “No, it wasn’t broken in the first place but I wanted it to do this instead and now it does! Spectacular!” 

 

Yaz can’t help but giggle. “You’re very odd, you know?” She steps over to the console. Over to the Doctor. 

 

The Doctor grins again. “I’ve been told it once or twice. You?” 

 

They’re not fond memories that come along with the question, but Yaz’s smile is still real when she says, “I’ve been told it loads more than once or twice, yeah.” 

 

“Good,” the Doctor says, leaning forward and grasping at Yaz’s bicep. “Otherwise you’d probably be a bit boring, and I can’t stand being bored.” She releases Yaz’s arm and sighs happily down at the console. “Are you going to behave now?” 

 

“Are you talking to your ship?” Yaz asks, trying not to rub at the place the Doctor touched her. 

 

“Of course I am! She’s been giving me trouble ever since my regeneration. Just doesn’t know me yet, I think. We’ll work on that.” The Doctor leans down and presses a loud kiss to a lever. 

 

Yaz giggles again and touches the console, just to see what it feels like. Metal, mostly. But warm. Too warm. “Is it alive?” 

 

“She is.” 

 

Yaz grabs her hand back. 

 

The Doctor laughs, not unkindly. “She’s alive all around us, not touching the console won’t help.” 

 

That’s a lot to take in. “Does it hurt her?” Yaz asks, meeting the Doctor’s eyes steadily. “Walking on her? Touching her?” 

 

The Doctor’s expression changes, morphs, too quick to follow, her eyes all the while seeming to see right through Yaz. “No,” she answers finally. “But she loves that you’ve asked.” 

 

“How do you know?” Yaz asks, her heart racing, her palms back to sweating against the inside of her pockets, her eyes still focused on the Doctor’s. “Did she tell you, just then? I didn’t hear her.” 

 

“You weren’t listening closely, then.” The Doctor examines her face again, with all the attention Yaz has seen her pay to a situation where she doesn’t have all the facts, but she’s going to find them no matter what. “You still wide awake?” she asks. 

 

Yaz nods, and the Doctor moves, quick and light her on feet, over to the door of the TARDIS. 

 

“Wanna look at the stars?” the Doctor asks, and throws open the doors before Yaz can answer. 

 

Yaz would have expected the air to start flowing out of the ship, but nothing changes. She can still breathe. Her face lights up with the wonder of it all, and she wonders if she’ll ever get used to this. 

 

She walks over to the door, to the Doctor, to the stars. “Could I fall?” she asks, wedging herself between the Doctor and the doorframe. 

 

“Yeah, you could,” the Doctor says. “But I’ll catch you. Well, might not be fast enough, probably am, still getting used to these limbs, but if I miss I’ll fly the TARDIS to get you. Can’t get far. Come on,” she says, settling down with a flurry of her long coat, “have a seat.” 

 

Yaz follows her lead, swinging her feet over the edge of the doorway, dangling them out into open space. Their shoulders brush. Yaz looks out into the open expanse and tries not to think about the first girl she kissed, in primary school, and how she hasn’t kissed a girl since, about the insults that got slung at her, on top of the ones that were already there. 

 

But the Doctor is an alien, even if she looks like a girl. And— 

 

“When we met,” Yaz says, “you said that you’d just been a white-haired Scotsman.” 

 

“I did,” the Doctor says, “I was.” She shrugs. “I guess it was time for a big change. Love it so far, except I do miss having long legs.” She kicks them to illustrate. “Good legs,” she amends, “but a tad short. Suppose I’ll get used to them soon enough.” 

 

That brings up so many questions that Yaz is burning to ask, but the one at the tip of her tongue is— “So you’ve kissed girls before?” 

 

“Oh yes,” the Doctor says, leaning back on her hands. “Girls, boys, gender nonconforming, and that’s just the humans.” She glances over and Yaz tries not to sink into the alive-material of the floor. “You know, what I look like’s got no bearing on who I kiss.” 

 

“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Yaz says, looking away. 

 

It’s cold out there. Yaz can feel it through whatever force-field is keeping her and the Doctor all snug and safe. 

 

“Why are you asking about kissing?” the Doctor asks. 

 

Cold, and unforgiving, space is. Like her peers, growing up. So unlike the Doctor, all bright energy and warmth, even as she seems so far away from anything Yaz could ever have dreamed up. 

 

“Did you want to kiss me, Yaz?” the Doctor asks. 

 

Yaz turns to look at her, unable to keep her eyes from widening; in terror, or in excitement, she’s not quite sure.

 

“Because you said we weren’t together, to your mum—to Najia, which is fine, but I honestly wasn’t—”

 

Yaz leans forward, drawn in like a satellite to orbit and presses her lips against the Doctor’s. Just once, fast and light as breath. 

 

Feels like breath too, as natural as breathing, but that breath when your head comes back above water, like the lake she jumped into on a family trip, freezing and biting. Yaz had jumped in, laughing, and the cold water felt like the end; her head breaking the surface, like a beginning. 

 

Her eyes snap back open. The Doctor’s expression is unreadable for the barest of moments, before she smiles again. Not wild and reckless, like Yaz is used to, but something softer. Something quieter. 

 

“That was nice,” the Doctor says, her eyes crinkling up as her smile grows. “Would you like to do it again?”

 

Yaz would like that. 

 

Yaz does just that. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to Ruth for the beta <3


End file.
